Reflections on Abortion

Many people undoubtedly have passion-driven views about the controversial matter of abortion. It is obvious that some write with their feet in their mouths and others with their heads in the sand. Some of the views expressed in the Gleaner and elsewhere smack of blatant intellectual dishonesty and unreliability. In essence, many persons who have sought to make a contribution to the debate have actually obfuscated on the matter and veered off track on unbelievably scandalous tangents.

Some have pointed to the church’s apparent or perceived hypocrisy by virtue of moral laxity and failure pertaining to other matters and have concluded that it has no moral authority to take a position on the abortion question. This is an irrelevant conclusion or a “red herring” argument. It is an attempt at diverting attention from the fundamental issue at hand. I have noticed that whenever the church takes a stance on any moral or ethical issue, it is accused of hypocrisy by virtue of its imperfections and flaws. However, if it remains silent on the matter it is charged for being an irrelevant monolith. This is so preposterous. The fact is the church should be applauded for taking a stance on such a controversial and divisive issue. Whether it is right or wrong is another matter.

Many people have delineated the position that because abortion was secretly practiced in the face of the church’s apparent silence before the current debate instigated by the Jamican Government in its examination of the possibility of amending the abortion laws, it should keep its mouth shut relative to the debate. The fact is the church has always been against abortion. Its not constantly throwing its anti-abortion rhetoric at the public was not necessarily indicative of its approval of the matter. Silence does not necessarily equate to consent. Anyone who concludes otherwise is guilty of allowing him/herself to appear to be bereft of sound reasoning ability.

A significant number of persons have argued that abortion should be allowable and legalized with respect to rape and incest. They conclude that no woman should undergo the psychological and emotional agony of carrying a child to full term that was a result of a violation of her sexuality and biological integrity. The woman, they vehemently advocate, should have the right to abort the child with all the inhuman and animalistic memories that come along with it. Indeed, rape and incest are heinous and outrageous crimes against humanity that should carry severe penalties. However, the life of a developing human person should not be terminated by virtue of the action, whether acceptable or unacceptable, of a mature human person. If indeed we all have the right to life, then a foetus is possessive of such rights as well, notwithstanding the rights of the pregnant woman. One person’s rights should not contribute to the negation of another person’s rights. This means therefore that we end up with a moral dilemma with respect to both the foetus and the pregnant woman. A fundamental question here is this: Which is the greater right- the foetus’ right to life or the mother’s right to destroy the foetus’ life and preserve her psycho-emotional integrity?

Some are of the view that whenever prenatal abnormality and perceived “threat to maternal physical and mental health and well-being” are the critical considerations, then “safe” abortion should be allowed by law. Well, who has the right to play God and determine who should live and who should be terminated? Don’t all human beings, including those born with physical and mental abnormalities and disabilities, have a right to life? Are we saying that persons with prenatal and congenital and other disabilities should not have been permitted to enjoy life on this planet like the rest of us “perfect” human beings? No wonder we treat people with disabilities with such inhuman and ruthless disdain and contempt. It seems there are some people who are hell-bent on preserving the perceived integrity of the human species to the extent that those whose physical and mental wholeness has been compromised should be obliterated or removed from the rest of us. What do we say about the threat to the life of the human being that is developing in the womb? Isn’t the foetus’ mental health and well-being to be preserved as well? I suggest that everyone’s mental and physical wholeness is important, including that of the innocent foetus. Fundamentally, a threat is not a reality. Even when it blossoms into some semblance of reality, the rights of both the mother and the foetus should be held in tension.

Finally, others have presented a perspective that is sociological in nature. They maintain that it is better to abort a foetus than to bring it into a world of poverty, suffering, deprivation, and dehumanization. They appeal to their sense of the greater good. This has always been a problem in the realm of ethics. Who or what determines the “greater good”? If we take this position to its logical conclusion, then many, if not most, human persons should have been aborted! Many of us should not be here. Interestingly, a significant number of the persons who use this argument have themselves emerged from circumstances of abject lack, deficiency, dispossession, and oppression. They have become successes. Why shouldn’t all other human beings who have not laid their feet on the earth be allowed to make the most of life’s opportunities as well and become noble members of the human race against the odds when they emerge from the womb?

We must not pander to the whims and fancies of those among us who, with Hitler-like philosophies and personalities, would want to decimate parts of the human family in an attempt at preserving the integrity and purity of the human species. All human beings, born and unborn, have a right to life, as long as they have not willfully, intentionally, maliciously, and illegally terminated the life of another!